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Rh in the front rank of the expositors and defenders of the constitution him who was then a page. So well did he acquit himself in the service of the senate, and so well commend himself to Senator Douglas, that he was appointed successively page, messenger, assistant-postmaster and postmaster of the senate, and private secretary of Senator Douglas, in whose family he lived on terms of great intimacy. His patriotic impulses were disclosed, during the rebellion, from the fact that he was first lieutenant in a volunteer company of government employees, organized to repel the famous raid of General Early on the national capital.

During the impeachment trial of Andrew Johnson, Mr. Gorman was removed from his position of postmaster of the senate on account of premature, possibly partisan utterances in defense of the president. He was soon taken up by Montgomery Blair and Reverdy Johnson, of Marjdand, and received an appointment to the collectorship of internal revenue for the fifth Maryland district, which he held until the incoming of the Grant administration in 1869.

In November of that year, he was elected a member of the house of delegates of the Maryland legislature, and in the same year became a director of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal Company. His reelection to the legislature followed in 1871, where he rapidly advanced to leadership, and was chosen speaker. The next year found him president of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal Company; and by virtue of his administrative gifts, his knowledge of men and issues, and his other qualifications for leadership, he passed by easy gradations, first to the senate of his own state, and then to the United States senate, in 1880, as the successor of William Pinkney Whyte. His service in the state senate covered three terms, during which time he made a strong and indelible impress upon current legislation. His first period of membership in the senate of the United States closed in 1899, but after an interim of four years he was again elected in 1902, to succeed George L. Wellington.

When Mr. Gorman first entered the United States senate, his reputation extended scarcely outside the boundaries of his own state, but it was not long before he began to attract the attention of his fellow senators. Following out the policy adopted early in his career, he first devoted himself to making personal friends, whether powerful or not; nor were they by any means confined to one party. This process went on until ere long he could claim all for his friends,